as shouldn't, and I honour you, sir, for your
filleral detarmination to find your father, sir, and--"

"Steward!" shouted the captain down the cabin skylight.

"Yes, sir!"

"Bring me the chart."

"Yes, sir!" and Mivins disappeared like a Jack-in-the-box from the cabin
just as Tom Singleton entered it.

"Here we are, Fred," he said, seizing a telescope that hung over the
cabin door, "within sight of the Danish settlement of Uppernavik; come
on deck and see it."

Fred needed no second bidding. It was here that the captain had hinted
there would, probably, be some information obtained regarding the _Pole
Star_, and it was with feelings of no common interest the two friends
examined the low-roofed houses of this out-of-the-way settlement.

In an hour afterwards the captain and first mate, with our young
friends, landed amid the clamorous greetings of the entire population,
and proceeded to the residence of the governor, who received them with
great kindness and hospitality; but the only information they could
obtain was that, a year ago, Captain Ellice had been driven there in his
brig by stress of weather, and, after refitting and taking in a supply
of provisions, had set sail for England.

Here the _Dolphin_ laid in a supply of dried fish, and procured several
dogs, besides an Esquimaux interpreter and hunter, named Meetuck.

Leaving this little settlement, they stood out once more to sea, and
threaded their way among the ice, with which they were now well
acquainted in all its forms, from the mighty berg, or mountain of ice,
to the wide field. They passed in succession one or two Esquimaux
settlements, the last of which, Votlik, is the most northerly point of
colonisation. Beyond this all was terra incognita. Here enquiry was
again made, through the medium of the Esquimaux interpreter, who had
been taken on board at Uppernavik, and they learned that the brig in
question had been last seen, beset in the pack, and driving to the
northward. Whether or not she had ever returned, they could not tell.

A consultation was now held, and it was resolved to proceed north as far
as the ice would permit, towards Smith's Sound, and examine the coast
carefully in that direction.

For several weeks past there had been gradually coming over the aspect
of nature, a change to which we have not yet referred, and which filled
Fred Ellice and his friend, the young surgeon, with surprise and
admiration; this was the long-co